Saint-Sever Abbey
The Saint-Sever Abbey in the Landes department is a Benedictine monastery that was founded by William II , Duke of Gascony , at the end of the 10th century.
Its numerous possessions stretched from the Médoc to Pamplona in Spain since the 11th century . Grégoire de Montaner, who ran the monastery from 1028 to 1072, made it a center of art and gathered the most talented sculptors and illuminators of his time, including Stephanus Garsia, the illustrator of Beatus .
The abbey has been a historical monument since 1911 and has been part of the UNESCO World Heritage Site "Camino de Santiago in France" since 1998 .
description
The monastery church, built in Romanesque style, is amazingly spacious. According to the “Benedictine” floor plan, it has a choir with seven apse chapels staggered in height and depth . The marble columns of the choir and transept come from the palace of the Roman governor of Morlanne , not far away. The colorfully painted capitals show a remarkable lion decor from the 11th century. 77 of the 150 depictions can be identified as Romansh. The dimensions of the church are impressive: 71 meters long and 31 meters wide, the transept even 41 meters. In front of the central apse chapel, the vault reaches a height of 18.60 meters.
The church has a circumferential gallery from which one can reach other chapels above the outer apse vaults. Transverse and side aisles made it possible to accommodate a considerable number of believers and pilgrims who were on their way on this stage of the Via Lemovicensis , a French section of the pilgrimage to Santiago de Compostela .
The abbey was badly damaged several times in the course of its history: it was struck by an earthquake in 1372, and it was besieged several times during the Hundred Years War when Gascony was a disputed territory between England and France. The monastery was destroyed and set on fire several times by the French. However, the side aisles have been partially restored. Then came the years of the Huguenot Wars with the massacres of 1569 and 1570 and the pillage of the ruins of the monastery by the Huguenots of Gabriel de Lorges , pursued by the Catholic troops under Blaise de Montluc . Only after the abbey had joined the Congregation of Saint-Maur in 1638 did the congregation begin to rebuild the apse and the buildings of the convent, which lasted until 1703.
At that time, a three-story structure was chosen for the cloister : the rectangular courtyard is surrounded by galleries on all four sides, on the ground floor it is open and with groin vaults , and on the two upper floors with clad arches.
During the French Revolution the abbey was closed and monastery buildings seized and sold in favor of the assignats . The church was reopened in 1795 as a simple parish church. The restorers of the 19th century designed the nave and the facade in the neo-Romanesque style, a contemporary interpretation of medieval architecture. A part of the buildings of the convent was demolished and the land sold, the arcades on the ground floor and parts of the upper galleries of the cloister have been preserved. The condition of the other buildings is very different, as they have been rebuilt many times by the new worldly users. The sacristy , the chapter house and the grand staircase are well preserved on the east side .
Origins
In the fifth century, Severus (later Saint-Sever) was commissioned by the Pope to evangelize the Roman province of Novempopulana . He was beheaded by the vandals and thus a martyr. In the eighth century, the Benedictines built a chapel to collect his remains.
The founding of a monastery not far from the ancient city of Morlanne, which ruled the Adour valley , was a political and religious act that was intended to further support the claim to rule of the Gascognan dukes.
The land was acquired in 988 by Wilhelm von Gascogne for the construction of a monastery. At that time there were a large number of rich Roman estates in the area , but no major cities. The Benedictine Abbey of Saint-Sever experienced an extraordinary rise in all areas, especially thanks to Grégoire Montaner, a monk from Cluny who became abbot in 1028. By the end of his tenure in 1072, the abbot, who was at the same time bishop of both Lescar and Dax , had begun the rebuilding of the church on the model of Cluny, with artistic masterpieces made by sculptors who were both experienced and sensible to stand out for new things. The reason for the work was a fire in 1060.
Historical context
The rise of Gascony , which followed the migration of the peoples , was largely due to the establishment of monasteries. It led to the reclamation of unused fields and forests and to a regrouping of the population around the abbeys and priories in the so-called Sauvetés . At the same time, bishops and monks tried to revive the Roman estates destroyed by the Vikings : Oloron , Nogaro , La Réole and Saint-Sever owe their existence to these efforts.
An influential abbey
In all areas, whether spiritual, political, social, economic or cultural, Gascony experienced an upswing, which it owed to the fundamental influence of the abbey in the entire province. At its height towards the end of the 11th century, the monastery was surrounded by a huge estate, which in the diocese of Aire-sur-l'Adour included numerous Roman villas, estates and churches within a radius of 35 km. Outside the diocese, it acquired properties in the Agen , Bazas and Pays de Born ( Mimizan Priory ) area. In addition, Saint-Sever owned a church in Navarra, not far from Pamplona, as well as individual properties in what is now the Gironde department, such as the church of Soulac-sur-Mer .
In Gascony, the selection of acquisitions followed the strategic interests of the time: defensive positions, passage areas on the Garonne and Adour, as well as the traffic axes of the various branches of the Camino de Santiago - all with a mutual distance of less than thirty kilometers. Whether Via Turonensis , Via Lemovicensis or even on Via Podiensis , the pilgrims found signs and hostels owned by the abbey everywhere. The fertility of the land played an equally important role in the choice of properties. The valley of the Ardor, the terraces of Buzet , the areas in Armagnac , the vineyards of the Bordelais were the focus of interest and economic activity of the monks, who themselves cultivated wine not far from the monastery.
The decline began with the Hundred Years War and ended with the wars of the Reformation era. In 1569 the Protestants razed the farm buildings. They were not rebuilt until the end of the 17th century. During the French Revolution, the monks were persecuted. The church was finally returned to its spiritual purpose, but the monastery buildings are now used as a town hall and by various administrative institutions.
Severus Reliquary
The Abbey of Saint-Sever had numerous relics in the Middle Ages . The most famous of these was the head of Saint Severus. It was destroyed during the Huguenot Wars, which wreaked havoc in the region. Although the sanctuary was partially restored after its destruction in 1569 (the altar was restored in 1681), the monks looked for a meaningful replacement.
According to an ancient tradition, the church of Sainte-Eulalie in Bordeaux owned the remains of Saint Clarus and his companions (including Saint Severus). In 1714 a delegation from the monastery received permission from the archbishop to transfer some of the relics of Saint Severus from the Bordeaux shrine. The official return was celebrated with great pomp in 1716. The current reliquary dates from 1783 and was a gift from Monseigneur Playcard de Raygecourt, the Bishop of Aire-sur-l'Adour. It is a testimony to the endeavor of the bishop to remain true to the French baroque in the midst of the classicist zeitgeist .
The Beatus of Saint-Sever
The Beatus , named after its author, the monk Beatus von Liébana from Asturias , is a commentary on the Apocalypse , the last book of the New Testament . It was compiled in the 8th century, probably as a result of a theological debate. During the Middle Ages it was copied a few dozen times across Europe.
The copy of the Abbey of Saint-Sever was made in the middle of the 11th century, about fifty years after the abbey was founded, by a group of copyists and illuminators around the master Stephanus Garsia and under the guidance of Abbot Grégoire de Montaner. Like every monastery, Saint-Sever had a writing workshop ( scriptorium ) to copy books, decorate valuable copies or repair them.
This manuscript, richly illustrated, tells of the visions of the apostle John . The only example in France, inspired by the Spanish versions, it is evidence not only of the master’s literacy and creative spirit, but also of the lively intellectual climate in the monastery of Saint-Sever in the 11th century.
A map that shows the living environment of the Saint-Sever monastery in the context of ecumenism plus a fourth continent in remarkable detail and precision is one of the gems of France, Aquitaine and Saint-Severs. This document was saved by pious monks through the wars of religion. It was found again at the beginning of the 17th century in the collections of the Archbishop of Bordeaux, François de Sourdis . After that it was kept in the arsenal of Paris. Today it is in the French National Library .
organ
The organ goes back to an instrument that was built by the organ builder Lépine in 1710. The organ today has 36 registers on three manuals and a pedal. The actions are mechanical and supplemented with Barker machines .
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Individual evidence
- ^ Brigitte English: Ordo orbis terrae. The worldview in the Mappae mundi of the early and high Middle Ages . Akademie Verlag, Berlin 2002, ISBN 3-05-003635-4 , pp. 360-384 .
- ↑ Information on the organ ( Memento of February 2, 2014 in the Internet Archive ) (French)
Web links
- Website of the Beatus de Saint-Sever
- Églises des Landes: le Beatus de Saint-Sever (French)
- Application documents for the designation of the World Heritage, here: Section "Saint-Sever, Abbaye" (PDF, 91.1 MB!)
Saint-Jacques-le-Majeur church in Asquins | Sainte-Marie-Madeleine in Vézelay | Sainte-Croix-Notre-Dame | Saint-Etienne cathedral of Bourges | Saint-Etienne Collegiate Church in Neuvy-Saint-Sépulchre | Church of Saint-Léonard-de-Noblat | Périgueux Cathedral | Cadouin Abbey | Church of Saint-Avit-Sénieur | Former Saint-Jean-Baptiste Cathedral of Bazas | Saint-Sever Abbey . Champagne: Notre-Dame Basilica in L'Épine | Notre-Dame-en-Vaux | Via Turonensis | Via Podiensis | Via Tolosana . Other buildings: Notre-Dame-du-Port (Clermont-Ferrand) | Mont Saint-Michel .
Coordinates: 43 ° 45 ′ 35 " N , 0 ° 34 ′ 27" W.